This has got to be the mother of all strip-and-search horror stories. A Florida mom was allegedly strip searched not once but twice in full view of passing motorists and her two children. And then, because that wasn't terrifying and humiliating enough, she says a female cop forcibly removed her freakin' TAMPON. She went Christian Grey on that poor mom!
Leila Tarantino was driving with her children, a one-year-old and a four-year-old, in the back seat. According to her lawsuit (yeah, it's that bad), she came to a complete stop. A cop in a car at the intersection waved her on, then changed his mind, made a U-turn, and pulled her over. The cops never told the woman why she was being searched -- but there has to be more to this story, right?
The way Tarantino's lawsuit tells it, you'd think the cops suspected her of being the Kingpin of a drug cartel, like Salma Hayek in Savages. I mean, why else would you be interested in what a mom might be hiding up in her lulu? And the cop who pulled her over held her at gunpoint from the beginning -- like she was dangerous.
But they never brought in drug-sniffing dogs and they never found anything drug-related on her. They DID allegedly make her sit handcuffed in the back of the cop car -- with her kids still sitting in her car -- while he called for backup. Does that mean a cop left a small child and a baby alone in a car for two hours? Brilliant.
Let's just say there's more to this story that we don't know and Tarantino really is Salma Hayek from Savages. Even if that were the case, that wouldn't justify this kind of treatment. Even alleged drug cartel kingpins have a few rights. Shouldn't a woman be read her Miranda rights before having a feminine hygiene product forcibly zoiked out of her body by someone else's hands? "You have the right to be silent, you have the right to remove your own tampon yourself..." There's about fifty shades of wrong going on in this story, and we'll probably never get the full picture. But whoever Leila Tarantino is I hope she wins her lawsuit.
Do you think anything might justify the police treating someone this way?
Image via Daquella manera/Flickr
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Comments 57
It seems to me that some police officers are over stepping their authority,in many situations.Its a shame that those children had to witness this,I understand that the mother had priors-but it doesnt mean her children need to be put through this type of action with the law.
This happened in the county I live in. I do not believe a word of it. She was issued a citation for rolling through the stop sign and for a violation of the restriction on her license... there was NO strip search and DEFINITELY no tampon removal. I do need to comment about the crazy things women do actually put up there. A friend is going through a divorce and his soon-to-be ex put the CAR KEY up her vagina so that he couldn't take the car (his only mode of transportation, when she has 2 other cars). I mean, she did put it in a ziplock first, so she must be sane, right??
I don't care how many times this woman has been arrested or what she had been arrested for. Strip searching her on an open road/highway and ripping a tampon out of her is beyond a rape equivalency. If she were suspect for ANYTHING, no matter how serious, they should have taken her into custody, informed her of her rights, and allowed for a lawyer AND a medical professional to be present before touching a feminine hygience product. This is just as horrifying as rape and I equivalate it to rape.
" "You have the right to be silent, you have the right to remove your own tampon yourself..." "this made me rotflmao. i think its both nasty and f-ed up.
This is not the way for a cop to conduct business. It sound really fishy. What excuse did the cop have for doing this? This was a mom with two small children.